Simple, neutral, flat. I like images like the above. The light was neutral, low contrast, with the sun behind a blanket of high level fog. However, the image was processed with a camera profile that has a neutral or flatter tone curve to the  “standard” tone curve a RAW converter usually uses. The dynamic range of this scene is well under 10 stops, probably closer to the 6-7 stop range, however, the image lends itself to a neutral camera profile to carry over the original scene more accurately. 

It's all to easy to increase contrast and make an image pop, but its not always the solution. This especially with modern cameras with 12+ stops of dynamic range where low contrast scenes can tend to look flat and ugly. But how does one make a flat scene not look flat and ugly? This can be very tricky without increasing global contrast, and it doesn’t work for every scene. The secret tends to lie in the highlights and shadows, and preventing tones in these areas from being dull and compressed.

I often expose to the right when presented with a flat, low contrast scene. In this way, I can dictate my brightest points a little short of clipping while taking the image. The use of a flatter camera profile in post production, keeps the portion of the curve in the highlights steeper since the curve is “straighter" and less s-shaped (see image below).  A steeper portion of the tone curve will represent tonal values in that area with higher contrast than a flatter more horizontal one. As seen in the image below, the portion of the top dotted curve between the green lines is steeper than the other curves, and therefore the tones in this area (mids and darker tones) will be of higher contrast and better separated than those using the red and purple line.

This is all a little difficult to describe, because the terminology of flat and steep can be misleading. For instance, the dotted line represents a standard tone curve. The red curve represents a flatter (flatter than standard) neutral tone curve. The purple curve represents a linear tone curve, which is also often referred to as a flat tone curve. However, the top right portion of the dotted curve tapers flatter and more horizontal, and this is why one should be careful how one describes things or uses the word flatter.

The red line creates an overall lower contrast image than the dotted grey standard line, but the right hand portion of the red line tends to be a little steeper (or less flat) than the dotted grey line. What this means is the mid zones to highlights are represented with slightly better contrast and tonal separation. The purple line better still, but at an even greater cost to the mid tone brightness and lower contrast dark tones. 

Now the use of exposing-to-the-right while using a neutral tone curve, might make the image look bright and lacking contrast in the shadows. One can adjust exposure for adjusting overall brightness, but in the RAW editor's Curves tool, one can set the black point a little closer towards the histogram and perhaps even the highlights as well if needed. This has now made the overall tone curve steeper, and represents all the tonal values in the image with a slightly higher contrast without any compression on either end. Choosing the contrast slider in Lightroom for instance, will increase the contrast just like the tone curves, but it will slightly compress the tonal values in both the shadow and highlights to prevent excess clipping. The contrast slider is effectively more efficient at increasing global image contrast but at a slight cost of inter-tonal separation in the shadows and highlights. 

Exposing-to-the-right is also another deep topic on its own, but in summary, it helps with capturing a significantly more amount of image data with which to work with. This lies with the fact that we see light differently to how a camera interprets light and records an image. It's a logarithmic vs linear thing. The other issue to note, is a standard profile creates a brighter image than a neutral or linear profile. Better said, the use of a neutral or linear profile makes an image seem darker since mid tones and highlights aren’t brightened as much as the standard profile. So exposing to the right is also desirable when using a neutral or linear profile to prevent a drop in perceived image brightness. See below where the same RAW image is processed with different profiles; Standard Profile on the left, Neutral in the middle, Linear on the right.

The reason why I tend to use the curves before I use the contrast slider to set my initial global contrast, is to achieve the best tonal separation in my highlights while maintaining a neutral global contrast look. Below I’ve linked an animated gif file illustrating this; I matched two versions of the same RAW file to each other while using a standard profile for the one and a neutral profile for the other. The differences are very subtle, but the tonal separation in the brighter portions of the image are better separated with the neutral profile. The only differences here are the base camera profiles used, exposure compensation for the standard profile, and setting black and highlight points using the curves tool for the neutral profile.

Below are more images from a short outing to the Walvis Bay lagoon. All shot using the Leica M11 and the Summicron-M 50mm V. A wonderful lens for landscapes. Luckily the images don’t convey just how icy the cold Atlantic wind was :)